"Was ever anything so mischievous?" Roderick exclaimed, in smothered vexation. "If they come over this way they will get our wind; and then it is good-bye to all of them. And we
cannot get away neither—well, well, was there ever the like now? There is only the one chance—mebbe they will go along to the others, and keep with them till they begin feeding in the afternoon. Indeed, now, it is a terrible peety if we are to miss such a chance—and not a hind anywhere to be on the watch!"
Happily, however, Roderick's immediate fears were soon dispelled. The new-comers slowly descended the slope; then they bore up the valley again; and after walking about awhile, they followed the example of the rest of the herd and lay down on the heather.
"Ay, ay, that is better now," Roderick said, with much satisfaction. "That is ferry well now. And since there is nothing to be done till the whole of them get up to feed in the afternoon, we will chist creep aweh into a peat-hag and wait there, and you can have your lunch, sir."
So there was another crawling performance down from this exposed height; and eventually the small party managed to hide themselves in a black and moist peat-hag, where their extremely frugal repast was produced.
"But look here, Roderick," Lionel said, "it's only twelve o'clock now; do you mean to say we have to stop in this wet hole till two or three in the afternoon?"
"Ay, chist that," the keeper said, coolly. "They will begin to feed about three; and until they go over the ridge, it is no use at all trying to get near them."
"And what are we to do all the time?"
"Chist wait," Roderick said, with much simplicity; and then he and the gillie withdrew a little way down the peat-hag, so that they might have their luncheon and a cautious whispering in Gaelic by themselves.
It was tantalizing in the last degree. The breathless consciousness that the deer were close by made him all the more impatient for the half-dreaded opportunity of having a shot at one of them. He wished it was well over. If he were going to miss, he wanted to have his agony of mortification encountered and done with, instead of enduring this maddening delay. The peat-hag became a prison; and a very uncomfortable prison, too. His sandwiches were soon disposed of; thereafter—what? He dared not smoke; he had no book with him; the keeper and the gillie, having withdrawn themselves, were exchanging confidences